Keeping the postal service up & running, one stamp at a time. Usually silly, sometimes cranky, occasionally a mix of the two.

With All Apologies: Sent to Finland, the U.K., & the U.S.

I’ve recently done some transgressing in my postcard life.

It all started when I signed up for one of the Postcrossing Forum “you choose” threads, in which the person tagging you makes a selection from cards you offer.

And I could not find the card selected by the person who tagged me.

I was SURE I still had the card the person selected. So I looked for it.

FOR WEEKS, I looked for that card.

It shouldn’t have happened, and it felt bad, but that’s what happened. I was just so sure it was waiting for me to find it. In fact, now that I’ve mailed something else to my poor tag-mate, I’m still fairly positive that postcard will jump out and say, “SURPRISE!”

The card she chose was a movie poster, so I sent her both of the movie poster cards I COULD find, plus an otter card since she likes animal cards, a landscape shot since she likes landscape cards, an Elephant & Piggie card since she likes children’s book illustrations, and several stamps, as she–well, you get it. I crafted an envelope from an old calendar page, & off that went. Oh, I also included a sticker sheet I had found while attempting to locate the card she actually wanted.

Then came the swap-bot debacle.

I went on a very nice little vacation recently, and while I was gone, a swap-bot trade for which I’d registered opened up for swapping. And before I’d returned, the “send-by” date had come and gone–all of this without me realizing it.

At some point, months ago, I had tried to adjust my swap-bot e-mail notifications, so I wouldn’t get trivial emails from them every five minutes (I really don’t want to know, “helpful” mod, every time there is a sale at Joann’s Fabrics. I DON’T CARE). It didn’t work; I still get the nonsense emails, but NOT the ones that keep me informed about swap deadlines).

Anyhow, if I had been keeping track of swap-bot, and my own calendar, this would not have happened. But when I came home to see I had for the first time missed a swap-bot deadline, I got down to business. I was to have sent each of my two partners a single postcard, but instead I sent them each four, along with extras, using their profile as a guide:

I also sent each of them a message (and a message to the swap admin, too) to apologize & let them know the actions I was taking. I got three very kind & understanding messages in return.

Have you ever found yourself on the wrong side of postcarding law? Feels so bad, am I right?